“Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.”
William Morris
One of the luxuries of having moved to a bigger house is it appears we have fewer belongings. However, as we haven’t bought any new furniture we haven’t got additional places to put things away just a larger floor area to fill!
We intend to be in this house for many, many year and I don’t want to use our general belongings as decoration. I want our house to look like a magazine house; perhaps a high aim with two young children.
SPACE
One of the books that had a large impact on me is Organising from the inside out by Julie Morgenstern (and I absolutely love that she is following me on Twitter). It is several years since I last read the book, but I clearly remember her concept of SPACE
S – sort
P – purge
A – assign a home
C – containerise
E – equalise
Can you believe I’d never thought of putting things in containers before reading the book. Wow they make it so much easier to put things away. I still have a desire for a label maker.
Decluttering
I’ve been having vague thoughts about sorting through our belongings since we moved. But after reading Becca Lou’s post last week about #declutterday I thought I can remove 5 items a week and it will help move me towards my goal of spending my time in pleasant surroundings.
I’ve started in our big bedroom. This is a room we don’t currently we use because we know it is likely to be split into smaller rooms once we have new floor plans from our architect. However, several things were placed in here when we moved in and we’ve never dealt with them.
When I’m tidying or cleaning I always start at the door and work clockwise or anticlockwise until I reach the door again and leave knowing the room is tidier or cleaner. I’ve started going clockwise in this room and I’m doing a combination of Sort and Purge. The children like going into this room and empting boxes and bags so I’m grouping similar items together such as my shoes and I’m purging the really obvious items we no longer want.
This week I have removed:
- Several baby toys and passed them to a friend who is expecting a baby in the next month
- Kitchen clock with chipped glass left by the previous owners put in the bin
- A metal wardrobe frame
I have to admit that the wardrobe frame has only gone as far as the garage because my husband thinks the tubes will be useful in the future, and I suspect he is correct. However, my aim of removing them from the house has been achieved and they are now in the location where they are mostly likely to be used!
I have removed 8 items this week.
I’ve made my first step to create my magazine house. How about you? How do you deal with clutter and bits and bobs?
Thanks for joining #declutterday pleased you are making progress.
Like the tip of moving round a round clockwise or anticlockwise, I tend to do a random attack which means I avoid the bits I’m scared of. Love this idea. Thanks
B
Becca, thank you for your comment and the declutter inspiration. The moving round a room was a revelation to me as well and meant I knew I’d finish a room, however if I get interrupted I sometimes I find I always do the same section of the room!